


don’t you know the kids aren’t alright

by reachedthebitterend



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Gen, M/M, mostly angsty, outsider pov, slightly fluffy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-02
Updated: 2020-05-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 09:48:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23969371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reachedthebitterend/pseuds/reachedthebitterend
Summary: friendship malex edition™
Relationships: Michael Guerin & Alex Manes, implied miluca
Comments: 4
Kudos: 63





	don’t you know the kids aren’t alright

**Author's Note:**

> posted on tumblr on 03/25/20

## one.

Michael had taken Maria at her word and only stayed over four times out of the week, probably because he spent the rest of the week with her inside of the bar.

But when the Airstream wasn’t parked in the back of the Pony, it was back at the scrapyard.

Maria gets out of her truck and walks around to get the brown paper bag full of food and booze that she’d gotten together.

Liz had called her and told her that Michael had been hurt, and the gist that she’d gotten from the conversation was that it had been serious, and that Michael had insisted on being left alone.

Maria figures that it’s early enough in their relationship that she shouldn’t expect to be let into every single aspect of his life, but she didn’t think there was any harm in offering a little company.

She shuts the door closed with her hip and makes her way around the Airstream towards the front.

She rounds the corner and then stops short when she hears Michael hissing.

She looks for him, and then ducks back towards the side of the Airstream, the back of her calf hitting the trailer hitch before she even realizes what she’s doing.

She had been expecting Michael to be alone, so it’s more than surprising that he’s not, but what’s more surprising than that is that he’s with Alex.

Thankfully, Michael was sitting with his back towards where she’d been walking from, because his gaze was focused over Alex’s head, but Alex’s gaze is focused in the space between them, where Michael had one of his arms propped up on a small table.

Michael hisses again, but this time she hears the click of something glass hitting something metal, and then Alex is exhaling loudly.

“I have no idea how you drove all the way here like that,” he says, and Maria can hear the sounds of something being unzipped.

“I’m multi talented,” Michael says, sounding like he’s talking through his teeth.

“You should’ve let Kyle stitch this up for you,” Alex says, and the words surprised Maria. 

She didn’t really question how Liz seemed to know so much about Michael. She had seen them in Texas. It seemed that in her quest to get Max Evans, Liz had made a friend in Michael.

And while she had known that Kyle had been making amends, especially where Alex was concerned, she hadn’t realized that he was someone that Michael hung around with as well.

Just like she hadn’t realized that Michael and Alex spent _any_ time together.

“But now you’re stuck with my basic medical knowledge,” Alex continues, and Michael makes a low sound, almost like something scared him.

“Are you sure we can’t just stick a bandaid over them and be done with it?”

Alex makes a low amused sound, “Are you afraid of a tiny needle, Guerin?”

“No,” Michael says firmly and too fast to actually be believable. “But I’m definitely afraid of the mad man holding it.”

Alex doesn’t really reply to that, and there is a tense silence between them that Maria definitely doesn’t understand, but it’s broken up by Michael saying Alex’s name in a soft low tone, like he’s trying to be careful.

“Don’t,” Alex says, firmly. “It’s okay. I got what you meant, but I still have to do this. You don’t know the definition of keeping still and you’ll tear the gash open again, no matter how fast you heal.”

Michael just exhales and Maria doesn’t hear him say yes, but he must nod or something, because the next thing that she hears is Alex speaking again.

“This will all be over before you know it,” he says, and then Michael makes a low pained sound.

“If you don’t keep still, I’m going to tie you up,” Alex bites out, not sounding serious about the threat.

Michael inhales sharply, a small hitch of pain before he speaks, “Is that a promise?”

Alex makes a scoffing noise and Maria doesn’t have to be looking at him to know that he’s rolling his eyes.

“Just keep still,” Alex says. “I’m almost done.”

“Yes, _Captain_ ,” Michael drawls flirty, but serious.

There is silence for a few minutes where Maria thinks about making her presence known.

“Thank you,” Michael says in a low voice, almost too low for her to hear.

Alex makes a low questioning sound, and Michael inhales deeply before exhaling again, “If you hadn’t kept your head, I don’t know what would’ve happened.”

Alex doesn’t say anything for a second.

“Well, one of us has to be the cool, calm and collected one, and I hate to break it to you, Guerin, but it’s definitely not you.”

Michael makes a noise in protest, but they both fall into silence for a few minutes before Alex speaks again.

“There,” he says. “All done.”

She can hear him, most likely, moving to stand, the chair scraping backwards through the dirt and gravel as he does. She hears more zipper sounds and then the rattle of a bottle of pills.

“Liz says that these should help with the pain, but you can’t mix them,” he sounds a little resigned, like he knows that Michael is going to tell him that he doesn’t want to take them, but to both their surprise, she hears the rattle of the bottle and then the low sound of something being uncapped.

“You know I also mean acetone, right?” Alex asks, which makes Maria furrow her brow. Was that supposed to be some sort of code word for something?

She moves to take a look, and sees that Alex is standing, looking at Michael with a raised eyebrow as Michael tips his head back and swallows the pills he just took dry.

He shakes his head and then turns back to the big first aid kit that Maria had missed at her first sight of them, putting things away.

“Kyle is probably going to stop by tomorrow, if you would prefer to avoid that, but as long as you keep the stitches on for a couple of days, you should be fine.”

“Leaving already?” Michael asks something strange in his voice, and Alex stops what he’s doing to turn to face him, tilting his head to the side like he’s trying to puzzle Michael out.

“Yeah, you didn’t want me here in the first place, I know how not to overstay my welcome, and besides, there’s something that I have to do before it gets too late.”

Michael just nods his head, and doesn’t say anything else.

Maria stares as Alex closes the first aid kit and then exhales roughly as he turns back to face Michael, clenching his jaw.

“Listen, since I’m already here,” he says, and Michael tips his head back to look up at him. “I know that you said you didn’t want my help, but I still went ahead and continued to look through the files we got from Caulfield, and there is something that I think you’d like to see.”

Michael stares at Alex in silence for long enough that Maria would’ve found it uncomfortable but Alex just lets him, gaze steady right on Michael, like this is something completely normal that happens all the time.

“Okay,” Michael says, voice careful. “What is it?”

Alex reaches up into the front pocket of his military fatigues, and pulls something that Maria is pretty sure is a picture and hands it to Michael.

Maria moves to lean back against the Airstream feeling the hot metal at her back.

She wonders how Michael learned what had happened to his mother exactly, and if it had anything to do with Alex.

She hears a low noise, that sounds almost like a sob and a soft ‘hey’ coming from Alex, and she closes her eyes tightly, biting down on her bottom lip.

Michael had told her so many things the night that they had officially gotten together, but never once in the speech that he’d given her had he mentioned himself, not really.

She hears a sound like something dropping to the floor, and curiosity gets the better of her, enough that she sneaks another look, and then decides that maybe it will be better to wait until Michael comes to her.

She turns to head back towards her truck, trying to blink away the image of Alex kneeling on the floor and Michael, leaning over him, their foreheads pressed together, and she really hopes that she won’t have to add Alex along to the provision that Michael doesn’t kiss any Lindsay’s.

## two.

Alex hadn’t helped to set up the lab, but he’d cleaned up the rest of the place, even going as far as to set up a training room for the aliens, where he had also set up a small space for Kyle to work out if he had to be here in the lab and couldn’t get to the gym.

Some of the equipment he’d brought was even better than the equipment at the gym in the hospital so Kyle found himself there most mornings.

This morning he walks into the room and promptly wishes that he had decided to use the gym at the hospital.

He had thought when he heard that Michael and Maria were dating that things would tone down between Michael and Alex, but no, Kyle still got the urge to ask them if they wanted him to leave the room every single time they were in the same room together.

They seemed to gravitate towards each other, and slowly shut everything else out like they were in their own world, when they both became focused on what the other was doing or saying.

Case and point, the fact that Kyle was able to walk into the room, that was dead silent, and that neither Michael nor Alex noticed that they weren’t alone.

Michael was too busy focused on keeping something that looked way too delicate and entirely too expensive in the air and Alex was too busy entirely focused on Michael and the stopwatch he had in one hand.

Michael makes a low pained sound, and then gasps, hands coming up to his head and Alex steps forward, easily catching what looked like a centrifuge, only grunting slightly as he sets it down on the floor at their feet and moves forward and stops Michael from curling forward, bracing him with his body.

“Come on, Guerin!” he says, as he tries to get Michael’s hands away from his head. “I know that you can do this!”

Michael shakes his head and his voice sounds thick with anger when he speaks. “No I fucking can’t, Alex! I need the acetone!”

“No, you don’t,” Alex snaps. “You’re dependent on that shit, and while I’m sure it does help you manage the pain, it’s not necessary! You know what you have to do!”

Michael drags his hands away from his face, and he looks at Alex, glaring so hard that Kyle is surprised that Alex doesn’t step away, and just gives Michael an unimpressed look instead.

“Yeah, well maybe terrified aliens were able to get themselves under control and use their powers on command after several hours of being tortured, maybe you should try some more of your family’s methods to really get this thing rolling.”

Kyle sees Alex’s reaction because he’s looking for it, unlike Michael, whose gaze moves to the side as he shakes his head, the way his eyes flash with an infinite sadness and pain that he hides beneath a steely look, and then takes a step away from Michael.

Michael’s gaze snaps back to him then, and Alex just nods his head once, before he’s stuffing the stopwatch back into one of his many pockets and then reaching for something at his back.

Kyle inhales sharply when he sees the gun and freezes along with Michael who goes so still that Kyle momentarily thinks that he unlocked a new ability to freeze at will.

Alex stands at attention, feet shoulder width, and he lifts his hand up, pointing the gun towards Michael, not dead center, but in his general direction, and Michael’s gaze goes hard and brutal, and then Alex is bending his arm and pointing the gun at his temple.

Michael’s face immediately loses all sort of hardness, as he seems to almost melt as he takes a staggering step towards Alex.

“Alex,” he says, voice questioning and shaking, and he looks like he’s two seconds away from somehow standing in the way of that bullet. “What are you doing?”

Alex gives him an impassive look. “A bullet can travel two thousand five hundred feet per second. The same principle applies here for holding something that weighs nearly two hundred pounds completely still for fifteen minutes. Only a little more advanced.”

Michael shakes his head a little, giving Alex a highly incredulous look, “You’re not planning on shooting yourself.”

Alex just blinks at Michael like he doesn’t see what’s so unbelievable about that.

“Alex!” Michael snaps. “Lower the gun.”

“Five,” Alex starts, and Michael furrows his brow like he doesn’t understand what Alex is doing until he takes the safety off the gun and continues with, “Four.”

Michael reaches out with one hand and Kyle can see that he tries to pull the gun away from Alex’s head, and Alex’s arms moves a little, but he still manages to keep a hold of the gun.

“Three.”

Michael moves towards Alex, and Alex takes a step backwards for each move Michael makes forward, keeping the distance between them equal.

“Two,” Alex keeps going, and Michael makes a low wordless noise, and then he shuts his eyes tight and holds both of his hands out towards Alex, and Kyle is more worried about the gun being pointed at Alex, even if he’s the one pointing it, and he’s about to make his presence known so that he doesn’t actually have to witness this, when the entire room starts vibrating, every single machine starts to shake, and even the walls seem like they’re trembling.

“One,” Alex says, finishing his countdown, finger on the trigger.

Kyle barely has time to do or say anything when there is the sound of the gun going off.

At the same time, every single thing in the room goes absolutely still, even the air feels like it’s still even though Kyle knows that that is impossible.

Alex is still standing on the other side of the room, and Kyle can smell the scent of singed hair in the air, but Alex looks otherwise unharmed, even though there seems to be a tiny explosion frozen right by his head.

Kyle’s eyes go to Michael, who is standing, breathing heavily, but in a steady rhythm, eyes open wide as he stares at where Alex is standing, both of his hands open in front of him, fingers barely trembling.

He twists both of his hands in the air and the explosion disappears into nothing, leaving behind a bullet frozen in the air.

Alex reaches up and plucks it out of the air like this is something that happens all of the time, and he hisses a little, probably because it’s hot, and then looks over to Michael.

“I honestly wasn’t expecting that to work that well,” he admits, and Michael drops his hands, exhaling roughly and the entire room seems to _breathe out_ with him, taking all of the heavy tension with it.

“What the fuck were you expecting?” Michael asks, sounding angry, but not as much as before. 

“That you would manage to pull the gun away?” Alex says, sounding more like he’s asking a question than making a statement.

Michael stares at him in disbelief, and Kyle shares the sentiment.

“Now,” Alex continues, putting the gun back in it’s holster against his back. “The centrifuge please, holding that still for a half an hour should be easy after that display.”

Michael shakes his head a little, but does what Alex says, reaching out with one hand, and easily lifting the object even higher than he had it when Kyle had walked into the room.

Kyle moves then and sits down on the bench, deciding that he’s had enough of Michael and Alex for today.

He puts his headphones in, and ignores them as much as they seem to be ignoring him.

Curiosity does get the better of him, and he finds himself looking over and pausing his music while he jogs on the treadmill.

Michael keeps the centrifuge in the air, and doesn’t even seem to be breaking a sweat and there is a look on his face that seems something like wonder.

“Time,” Alex says, voice sounding so proud, smiling widely at Michael, that Kyle is surprised that he doesn’t just reach out and pull him into a hug.

Michael lowers the centrifuge carefully, and he exhales once it’s on the floor and turns to Alex, who raises an eyebrow at him in question.

“Fine,” Michael says. “You were right.”

Alex’s smile just widens, and Kyle can see the confused light in Michael’s eyes at the sight.

“I knew you could do it,” he says, reaching out and patting Michael on the arm. “And no acetone! I’m very proud of you.”

“Now,” continues turning towards a clipboard he has propped on the back wall, so he doesn’t see the way that Michael’s eyes go from confused to hungry within a millisecond.

There are plenty of things that he knows about Michael that he would prefer never to know, but the fact that he apparently has a praise kink was definitely at the top of that list.

Kyle turns the treadmill off, and makes enough noise as he’s leaving for them to know that they definitely weren’t alone.

## three.

Isobel turns the corner expecting to find Michael alone so she finds herself stopping short, right next to the front of his truck when she hears him laughing, long and loud and _delighted_. Isobel tries to wrack her brain for the last time she’d heard Michael laugh like that. She’s seen him snicker at jokes and chuckle when he’s flirting and smirk a whole lot and smile, small but genuine when he’s happy, but she can’t remember the last time he laughed like it was something that he couldn’t help.

“That was terrible,” she hears him gasping out between breaths.

She’s not expecting Alex Manes to be the one to snort and say, “Yeah, well you’re the one who laughed.”

She moves a little closer, and she can see them lying back in the back of the truck. Michael is lying flat, hands crossed behind his head, propping him up as he looks up at the sky. Alex is lying on his side, propped up on one hand, staring at Michael.

She hears Michael inhale deeply and then exhale, the cold air making a plume of smoke escape his mouth.

“How long?” he says, and she hears Alex sigh, and turn a little so that he’s looking out across Max’s backyard.

Isobel crouches down right by the front wheel, not really wanting to hear this conversation, but feeling like if she moves she’ll interrupt their conversation, and something about it feels important.

“A few weeks,” Alex says, sounding like he hadn’t actually wanted to speak.

She hears the truck moving as though someone moved, and Michael’s careful breathing.

“Just ask,” Alex says after a few seconds of silence.

Michael exhales loudly and then the truck moves again, and Isobel looks over to the back of the truck and she can see that they’re both sitting, facing Max’s backyard, and staring at the lights that make up Roswell.

They’re both quiet for long enough that Isobel’s legs start to fall asleep, and she thinks about making her presence known since it’s not like they’re talking about anything important.

She’s making to stand up when Michael speaks.

“Are you planning on coming back?” Michael asks, voice almost too low for her to hear.

“Yes,” Alex says with no hesitation, almost before Michael even finished speaking, and from the way she can see Michael turn to face him, she knows that Michael wasn’t expecting him to answer so fast. “Roswell has never been home, but there are still some people here that I care about.”

Alex doesn’t look at Michael as he says it, and Isobel can’t make out their faces, but there is something in Michael’s silence that feels too heavy for the words that Alex said.

“Tell me, Guerin,” Alex says, breaking the silence. “What is the center of gravity?”

“The point in any solid where a single applied force could support it,” Michael answers, speaking slowly, voice coloured in confusion.

“Actually,” Alex says, and Isobel sees him turning to face Michael as well. “It’s a v.”

There is a second of silence where Isobel cannot believe that Alex just said that, and Michael’s silence is heavy with judgement, and then Alex snickers, the sound falling out of his mouth, before he starts to giggle helplessly, and then Michael loses it completely, laughing hard and leaning to push Alex hard enough that he moves backwards and the truck moves with him.

“That’s even more terrible than the last one,” Michael says between laughter.

Isobel can see Alex well enough now, that when he smiles it looks so bright and happy that it could probably be seen from space. “Yeah, but you still laughed.”

Michael just shakes his head, and Isobel wonders if he’s ever going to tell Alex that he didn’t laugh because the joke was funny, but because _Alex_ found it funny.

## four.

Liz is waiting for Michael by his truck since she already knows that Kyle will be taking Alex home and she doesn’t like the idea of him driving home alone. 

She’s looking up at the sky when she hears footsteps, and she turns towards the door and spots Alex walking out, his arm in a sling.

She almost calls out to him, but Michael walks out right behind him, and reaches out, stopping him right in front of Kyle’s car.

“Wait,” he says, and Alex turns around a little too roughly, pulling away from Michael’s hold and taking a step backwards.

“What is it, Guerin?”

Liz can just make out Michael’s expression from her position, but his body language is easy to read, and his fists are clenched to his sides, and he keeps rocking on his heels, and he doesn’t speak, he just continues to look at Alex, or well, at where Alex had told them that he’d gotten shot.

He had played it off, but he’d been gone for a few weeks, more than enough time to recover from the worst.

Alex sighs and opens his mouth, but Michael beats him to it.

“Can I see?” He asks, sounding both hesitant and determined.

Alex barely hesitates before he’s pulling the sling over his head and then popping open the buttons of his shirt.

Michael moves closer then, eyes intent on Alex’s shoulder.

Liz sees his hands unclench, fingers stretching out before he shakes them out a little, eyes so intent, like he’s trying to heal Alex through his gaze alone.

As soon as she thinks it, Michael moves forward, hand raised.

Liz ducks down to avoid being seen as Alex looks around, one of his hands coming up to trap Michael’s hand against his chest.

“What are you doing?” He asks, voice a low hiss that Liz almost doesn’t hear.

“What do you think?” Michael snaps back, sounding a little exasperated.

“You can’t do that,” Alex says, and there is a sound, almost like a scuffle, before Alex speaks in a low urgent voice.

“Hey,” he says, like he’s trying to get Michael’s attention. “I have a doctor’s appointment in a few days and a miraculous recovery is going to be hard to explain. Otherwise I’d let you do it in a heartbeat. It’s really uncomfortable.”

Michael makes a low sound.

“I can always just go into your head and make you forget all about the pain,” Michael suggests, but it sounds half hearted at best.

Alex makes a low humming sound, “Don’t tempt me.”

Michael just laughs low and amused, but doesn’t say anything else. 

There’s enough silence that Liz feels safe enough to straighten up and check if the coast is clear and she exhales softly when she sees them.

Michael has his forehead pressed to Alex’s shoulder and Alex has one hand in his hair, and they don’t seem to be doing anything but just breathing together.

They look so comfortable in each other’s space that Liz realizes for the first time that maybe their previous relationship was more serious than she’d thought.

Kyle walks out of the building then and he makes a low aggrieved noise when he sees them.

“Come on,” Kyle says, walking by them and hooking his arm around Alex’s, dragging him along. “I want to get at least four hours of sleep.”

Liz doesn’t bother to duck out of sight, since Kyle waves at her, but she’s distracted by Michael’s face as he watches Alex leave, something sad, but somehow sweet.

Liz keeps staring at him until he turns and catches her at it.

He raises an eyebrow at her, and she raises one back at him as he walks closer.

“Figured you’d want some company,” she tells him.

Michael just shrugs, but unlocks the truck with a flick of his wrist.

She gets into the passenger’s seat worrying her bottom lip between her teeth and waits until they’ve been on the road for a few minutes before she decides to say something.

“You don’t really talk about it, but if you ever _do_ need to talk about Alex, or anything, I’m-”

“No offense, Liz,” Michael says, fingers tightening around the steering wheel. “But I really don’t want to talk about it.”

Liz makes a face at him. “Maybe talking about it will help you-”

The radio blasts loudly with static for one second before the tape clicks and starts playing a country song that Liz is pretty sure was made before she was born.

She just rolls her eyes and leans back in her seat.

## five.

Jenna isn’t exactly sure how she got volunteered to chauffer Alex to the next Team Save Max meeting, but having Michael Guerin in the passenger’s side seat of the car wasn’t exactly one of the things mentioned when Liz had asked her for the favor.

The only good thing is that she doesn’t have to get out of the car or even call Alex.

Michael gets out of her car before it even properly stops, and she stares as he walks towards the front door, crouches down by the plant pot holding a ficus too shiny to actually be real, and digs around in the pot before he pulls out a shiny silver key covered in dirt.

Jenna watches him letting himself into Alex’s home like he pays rent there and wonders if everyone does that or if Michael is just a special case.

He’s rushing out of the house not even a full minute later, and he looks a little flustered, and a lot preoccupied. She stares at him as he walks past her car, and then realizes it and turns back around, getting into the backseat wordlessly.

His brow is furrowed, and Jenna can feel the discontent vibes and she wonders what the hell happened in the less than a minute that he was inside of Alex’s house.

Alex walks out of his house a couple of minutes later, and it doesn’t take a genius to know that that is definitely sex hair.

It also doesn’t take a genius to figure out that he is pissed the fuck off.

He waves at Jenna through the open passenger side door window, and then gets into the backseat pushing Michael aside.

Jenna seriously would like to curse out her libido for getting hooked on Liz Ortecho so badly that she said yes when Liz asked her to please pick Alex up.

She puts the car into drive and Alex turns to Michael and hisses in a low angry voice, “Do I really have to have a conversation with you about privacy?”

Jenna distinctly knows that this is not the way to get through to Michael Guerin.

“Maybe, if you had told me that you were dating someone, I wouldn’t have just walked in!” Michael answers back, voice coming out harsh and accusing.

“I’m not dating anyone,” Alex answers back through his teeth.

Jenna glances at the rearview mirror and she can see Michael giving Alex a pointed look.

Jenna can feel Alex rolling his eyes.

“You don’t have to be dating someone to have sex with them. _You_ know that.”

Jenna can feel the unhappy vibes exuding from Michael.

“And besides, even if I was dating him. You still have no right to walk into my house uninvited!”

“That’s never been a problem before!” Michael snaps back.

Alex exhales loud and rough, and Jenna glances at the rearview mirror again to see him giving Michael a tired look.

“Things are different now.”

Michael doesn’t respond to that, and Alex doesn’t say anything else.

The rest of the drive passes in silence and once they get to the Crashdown, Alex gets out of the car, before Jenna even fully parks it, and it makes her hum a little thoughtfully.

She looks to see Michael still sitting in the backseat, staring as Alex walks into the diner with eyes that are entirely too big and wet for his face.

He looks really sad and upset, and Jenna distinctly remembers him kissing Maria goodnight the last time that she had seen them together.

“You’re actually an oblivious idiot,” she tells him, and Michael turns to her, giving her a confused look, and Jenna just shakes her head.

Trying to get Michael to understand something by force was an exercise in futility. She remembered Max failing at it more than once, and it looks like Alex has decided to just let him come to his own conclusions, but the problem is that she’s sure that Michael is coming to all of the wrong conclusions.

It might be worth it to stick around just to see the fallout.

“If you don’t get it, I’m not going to be the one to explain it to you,” Jenna replies before she gets out of the car and heads towards the diner.

## six.

Max is setting the empty glasses down in the sink so that they’re out of the way when he sees Michael walking down the hall, fast enough to be suspicious.

Max follows after him after barely a moment’s consideration, and finds himself outside on the side of the house where all the cars are parked, Michael momentarily out of sight.

Max doesn’t have to search long to find him again, heading to the only car with a light on, Alex’s.

Max slows down and hides behind Kyle’s SUV, peering around the corner to see Michael slowing his walk as he gets closer to Alex, who is bent over the driver’s seat like he’s getting something out of the glove compartment.

“Not going to complain about the secret message if this is the sight I’m getting,” Michael drawls.

Alex moves to get out of the car, and Max can feel the unimpressed stare all the way where he’s standing.

“I have a present for you,” Alex says after a few minutes of silence where Michael moves to lean back against Alex’s car.

“Oh yeah,” Michael responds easily. “What’s so special that you couldn’t give it to me in front of everyone?”

Alex reaches inside of the car and pulls out a backpack, which he hands to Michael, zipper already open.

Michael gives the bag a confused look, but grabs it and takes a look inside.

Max practically feels the shock going through Michael as whatever it is that Alex has in the bag surprises the hell out of him.

He reaches into the bag, and Max can see the way whatever is inside lights up as he touches it reminding him of their pods.

Michael moves his shocked eyes from inside of the bag to Alex.

“What?” he asks, breathless, but a slight undercurrent of anger.

Alex inhales deeply, and he squares up like he’s preparing himself for a fight.

“Jim Valenti had that hidden in his cabin. I found it months ago when Kyle went to figure out if he had anything hidden out there and we found the bunker he had fully stocked for Rosa going through withdrawal. I wasn’t exactly sure what it was until you showed me what you had in your bunker.”

Michael looks back inside of the bag and then back at Alex.

“And you didn’t think to tell me that you had it then?”

Alex makes a low sound and takes a step towards Michael, and Michael takes a step backwards and Alex freezes.

“To be honest with you, no, I didn’t even think about telling you that I had it. I wasn’t exactly thinking about anything else but the fact that you’d been planning to leave the planet.”

Michael just scoffs low and disbelievingly shaking his head. “What does it matter to you if I want to leave or not?”

Alex just laughs hollowly and drags his hands through his hair.

“You ever get tired of reopening this wound?” Alex asks, rhetorically, and the words seem to surprise Michael who turns to look at him, brow furrowed.

Max starts thinking that maybe he shouldn’t be witnessing this conversation.

“I get that you’ve obviously moved on, and are happy with someone else, but none of that negates the fact that I care about you, and that I would be devastated if you went somewhere where I couldn’t find you.”

Michael’s face goes slack, and he just continues to look at Alex who turns and paces a little in place as he keeps talking.

“I had hoped that these last couple of months you would’ve figured that out by now, but obviously we’re never going to get on the same page, so here’s this.”

He turns back towards Michael. “I kept it out of some sick and twisted sense that as long as I had it, some part of you would still be mine, but it’s time to let go of that. And let go of any hope of _someday_. All I want is for you to be happy, and you are, and it still hurts that it’s not without me, but it’s the only thing that I have ever wanted for you.”

“Alex,” Michael says, shaking his head, eyes wide and wet as he takes a step towards him.

Alex just shakes his head. “It’s alright, you don’t have to keep explaining yourself. I get it, okay?”

Michael just stares at him not saying anything, and Alex turns away, blinking his eyes rapidly before he inhales deeply and turns back to Michael, a brittle smile on his face.

“Happy birthday, I had a fun time but I think that I-”

“I am happy,” Michael says, interrupting him, and Alex just exhales shakily, turning away from Michael momentarily. “And I like making Maria happy. We’re good together. She makes me feel needed and mattered, and I like that.”

Alex makes a low sound, almost like a sob, and he just says, “Guerin,” in a sharp voice, and Michael just shakes his head and moves closer, dropping the bag and reaching for Alex before he can move back.

“But I’m not in love with her, I like her a lot, and I hoped that it would’ve been enough, but it’s not, Alex. It’s not enough when being in the same room as you makes me feel so much more than I do when I’m alone with her.”

Max really desperately wishes that he had left when Alex had given Michael the backpack, so he turns around and sneaks away as quietly as he can, really not wanting to witness whatever was going to happen next.

“What are you trying to say?” he hears Alex asking, voice shaking a little.

“I’m saying that you should keep the bag,” Michael answers back, almost too low for Max to catch it.

“But you like Maria,” Alex says, pushing the words almost like a barrier between them,

“Yeah,” Michael admits easily. “But not as much as I like you.”

Max gets too far to hear anything else, but he turns at the door and catches a glimpse of them, standing still, foreheads pressed together.

He shakes his head and walks back inside of the house wondering why his siblings have to make love so complicated.


End file.
